A/N: Well, the plan wasn't to take a year, but here we are. The final stretch. Bear with me a bit: there was a time long ago where RSoB was once going to be a 9-12 volume-spanning monster, and a fair chunk of the delays current and previous was thinking on how to get a conclusion in V3. Mainly because V3 was initially meant to end darker than the original canon.
Compared to the chaos outside, Hangar 6 was as silent as it got. There were no alarms. Bodies were strewn across the steel floor, scarred, scorched and ravaged just as the ground beneath them was. Smoke swallowed up the ceiling only to be snatched away by the open exit to the night air. What noises could be heard throughout Amity had now become nothing more than a muddy mess of negativity and panic. Only one Bullhead was operational. It was the only source of light, barring the smoldering ruins of another beside it.
Torchwick stood at the Bullhead's ramp, little more than a silhouette. "I'd say 'look what the cat dragged in', but it sounds like you got rid of that little problem, Emerald," he said over his shoulder.
It was in that moment, standing in the middle of the carnage as Emerald stepped out from the cockpit to look at her, that Penny knew she had nowhere to go. She looked to the ruins of the other Bullhead. Penny could detect the remnants of Ruby's aura, but to her surprise, there was no notification or reading from her systems. She just knew.
Penny steeled herself. "Is Ruby alright?" she asked.
"Yeah, yeah, she's fine," Torchwick said. "Knowing my luck," he finished under his breath.
Heavy footsteps came from behind her, and Penny turned side-on to the new person approaching. She was not ready to leave her back to the one who probably only saved her for his own dark means.
Mercury stumbled into the hangar. He paused. His eyes stared into hers. Penny thought of every way to escape; if this was a trap, she knew her chances. She was willing to fight.
But rather than attack, Mercury scoffed. "Cinder won't like this," he said. Then, with a shake of his head, he walked by without sparing another glance in her direction.
Nodding for Penny to follow, Torchwick let him pass. "Unless you want to wind up dismantled by Atlas, Penny, you better get moving. Let's go!"
She was walking before the thought even finished in her mind that he was correct. Penny could feel it, now: that pressure deep down pushing her actions. Was that her? The protocol? Whatever strange power that jumped from Pyrrha Nikos to her? Fearful, Penny stepped onto the Bullhead. She felt guilty, but why didn't she want to go back and do the right thing?
While the others moved to the cockpit, Penny remained behind on the ramp, looking back at what she was leaving behind. Who she was leaving behind. But survival was the primary objective. That was above everything else. She'd already done too much to just give up and die now, she bitterly thought.
Those thoughts came to a screeching halt when she saw Weiss and Blake stop at the entrance to the hangar.
"Penny! Are we ready to go?" Torchwick called from the cockpit.
Fear froze her in place. Penny waited for that instinct to push her to betray her friends. To attack them. To demand she do worse than she already had... but nothing happened. Penny smacked the button to bring the ramp up.
"We... we're all clear. Hic!" The whine of the Bullhead's starting engines drowned out Weiss' cry, but Penny could still hear it. She watched her best friend until the door fully closed and the Bullhead took off.
She wasn't being controlled. She had free will. But she was still here. Was that better or worse? What happened to her?
Taking Control
What happened to Penny? As Weiss' throat grew sore from shouting, yet Penny ignored every call, she just couldn't understand. Their friendship couldn't have just been a lie. Penny was panicking about being a hero just a few hours ago, and now she was a murderer? Running off with Cinder's crew? Was she the one who killed all of these guards around her too? Questions whirled inside Weiss' head until the world swam. One stood out, though: she knew who might have the answers.
Before Blake could get a word in, Weiss whirled and slammed her up against the side of the entrance, eyes burning just as much from rage as from the tears in her eyes. But rather than wriggle away, use her Semblance or even speak in her defense, Blake only let her head hang.
"I... I'm so sorry," Blake muttered, and for a second, Weiss wished she could summon up the white-hot fury Yang drew on, the righteous anger Ruby could tap into, the murderous wrath lurking inside Adam. It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair! Blake didn't get to play a part in all of this, she didn't get to fight back and side with Cinder, just to act misguided!
Then the second passed and, hands trembling, Weiss forced herself to let Blake go and watch her slump down against the wall.
"Explain," Weiss hissed.
Blake grit her teeth. "I... The plan was to trick Pyrrha into killing the Polendina girl. There'd be an uproar when the world found out she was a machine, and then the White Fang would use the confusion and chaos to take over Beacon and Vale completely. All the world's best students would be trapped in Amity by the Grimm and..." She shook her head. "I thought the White Fang, but I don't know where they are."
"So this was really about the White Fang, then?" Weiss accused.
"No!" Blake finally looked up, tears flowing freely. "That wasn't it! None of that"—she motioned off to where the Bullhead once was—"was supposed to happen. We had a virus that'd get rid of Atlas' security, Cinder said they'd have the rest of Atlas' fleet handled, and the White Fang was just a distraction. We had to get as many defenders away from Ozpin as possible so he couldn't use them as human shields. I-if we did that, and we could take the Maiden powers... but that light in that robot's eyes was just like..."
Maidens? Powers? Human shields? Weiss growled and pulled Blake back up to her feet by her collar. "You're not making any sense!" she shouted. "What 'Maidens'? What light? What does Penny have to do with this, and why would you cause all of this for a headmaster!"
Gunfire echoed down the corridors behind them. Weiss turned and leveled her rapier. With the sound of tearing metal, pieces of an Atlesian Knight were sent skidding down the hall in a shower of sparks. Panting, Adam stepped over the wreckage, eyes and blade glowing a bloody red. He looked at them only long enough to confirm Blake was alive. His lips twisted into a scowl.
"Where is Cinder?"
Cinder moved like lightning. Her nails dug into Ruby and Yang's faces before they could react. Blazing a path across Beacon, she dragged the two across the rough stone of rooftops until Ruby suddenly turned into a flurry of petals. Thrown off balance, Cinder was distracted just long enough for Yang to blast her away with a shot from her gauntlets. Even so, the momentum was enough to have Yang flying off of a roof and into an empty plaza until Ruby swept behind and caught her. Beacon's library loomed beside the two, its windows dark and the building surrounded by wide, empty roads. It was one of the few places in Beacon that wasn't packed with civilians there for Vytal.
Good, the two sisters thought: a free space to fight.
And they'd need all of it. Cinder leaped from a rooftop and, with a spinning kick, sent a roiling storm of fire out across the entire plaza. Ruby stepped in front of Yang, focused her aura, and prayed her plan worked. With a turn and swing of her scythe, ruby-red aura slashed out ahead of her. In a clap of thunder, the space between the sisters and Cinder was swallowed up in a cloud of embers.
"Yes!" Ruby cheered, then squeaked when Cinder plunged through the cloud, swinging a glass longsword for her head.
Yang shoved her sister back, struck down Cinder's strike, and once more, the two were left to trade blows. Once more, Yang was forced on the defensive, trying to defend against the rain of slashes from a blade that kept shattering and reforming. Slashes from a longsword. Stabs from a rapier. Jabs from a gauntlet. Cinder grinned as one strike finally broke through Yang's guard, but cried out in agitation more than pain when a sniper shot over Yang's shoulder left her stumbling. Yang pressed her advantage, and every swing she made was joined by a slash from Ruby's scythe. Every opening was covered by a shot from Ruby's rifle. The two sisters had fought together for years, and now they fought as one, not a space between their attacks.
There was no need for Ruby to call their next strike: Yang knew when to crouch down. Cinder looked high at Ruby. Ruby swung the haft low into Cinder's legs. The blade curled behind her ankles. It wasn't enough to knock Cinder over, but when Yang leaped forward, Ruby fired Crescent Rose and yanked Cinder off of her feet. Yang was safely airborne. She struck Cinder in the jaw, pumped her aura into her shotguns and fired, sending Cinder flying into the metal fence surrounding the library. Bricks and twisted pieces of steel from the fence scattered from the impact.
Ruby gave her no time to rest: two shots and she was spinning down from above. But Cinder was quicker in rolling back to her feet. A swipe of an glass gauntlet, and she knocked Ruby's swing off target. It wasn't enough to keep Ruby from firing again and sending herself safely out of the way of Cinder's retaliatory fireball. While Cinder's attention was focused on Ruby, however, Yang had once again gotten within range to take her on hand-to-hand. She left herself open, and Cinder took the bait with a wild hook to her side.
When Yang caught Cinder's arm under her own and locked it in place, Yang expected a look of panic. Unfortunately, she saw only greater confidence in Cinder's perpetual smile. Yang heard fabric tearing, then Cinder turned and drove her sharp heel into Yang's stomach. A blast of fire sent her crashing through the library's entrance. Yang had just enough time to look down at the gauntlet she held. And the sleeve of Cinder's dress, glowing ever brighter from the Dust within. It sparked.
In a flash of blinding light and scorching heat, fire and smoke blew out every window of the library.
"Yang!" Ruby screamed and spiraled down in a red comet behind Cinder, swinging with all her might.
Without even turning to face her, Cinder caught her scythe by the blade.
"You two must think I'm a fool," Cinder said with a jeering laugh. "Did you really think I'd waste my time with you two if I couldn't kill you?" She suddenly breathed in through her teeth in pain and pulled her hand away from Crescent Rose. A stinging line of red stretched across her palm. Cinder scowled: Mercury hadn't been mistaken about the girl's abilities, after all.
Cinder had no further time to think as, silver eyes burning with light, Ruby launched herself into a whirling frenzy. Reforming her broadswords was all Cinder could do to deflect her fury. The blade of Crescent Rose carried a bloody glow that peeled away into rose petals, and Mercury's claims were only further confirmed when one slash swept across her cheek and left a thin—but still felt—slash across it. The girl's swings only grew stronger as Cinder inched closer to slipping into Ruby's guard. The stalemate was broken as quick as it started: Cinder fused her blades together and parried Crescent Rose to the side.
Then Ruby began to glow, and Cinder realized too late that she was taking all of that time to gather her aura. Ruby spun with the momentum, shouted and threw all her aura into a single swing. Cinder sprung back, but rose petals and a mist of energy followed a ghostly, bright-red clone of aura as it followed up and shattered Cinder's greatsword with its own slash. Ruby snapped her scythe's blade straight out and raced through her clone to stab Cinder in the next moment, launching her into the fires devouring the library from within.
Sweat beaded on Ruby's brow from exertion and the increasing heat of the inferno ahead. Within, however, the fires ignored Cinder while she rose to one knee and placed a hand to her collar. It came away wet with blood, yet Cinder only scoffed and stood tall.
"My, my, little girl, I didn't think you had such a thing in you," she taunted as her aura stitched the wound together. "I was toying with you before, but if that's the way you—" A hook to the stomach and shotgun shell blasted Cinder into the balconies of the higher floors. As Cinder snatched the railing and used it to flip back to her feet, Yang stalked out from the flames, fist smoking. The fire may have ignored Cinder, but with Yang's hair glowing just as bright and her eyes burning red, Yang ignored the fires.
The sisters couldn't help but notice how while their breathing was labored and rough from the smoke, Cinder barely looked tired. She gripped the railing tight enough for it to crack. Flames began to lap at it from her hands. Her dress lit up as vibrant as the carnage around them, and where her sleeve was torn, fire rippled and shot across her arm in erratic patterns. Cinder held her other hand out and formed a bow from the endless supply of ashes. With Ruby's scythe shining red and Yang's hair alight with a fire of its own, even in the burning building, the three warriors stood out even amidst the inferno.
"So be it," Cinder said, voice dripping with anger.
Yang and Ruby shot off for Cinder, and she rushed deeper into the library. Explosive slugs, sniper rounds and fireballs echoed through the corridors as their fight moved deeper and left only destruction in its wake. Their world was nothing but heat, flaring lights and the cacophony of detonating Dust, roaring flames and crumbling walls. When a Semblance-empowered shotgun burst from Yang launched Cinder through a last door up onto the roof, despite the walls of smoke and ember that surrounded the library outside, it was still like being plunged into a pool of ice water.
With a shout of frustration, Cinder snapped her bow over her knee, and the glass melted down into her broadswords once more. Yet, now, they dripped from the sheer heat boiling within. Veins of molten orange shot through them, all bright enough to burn when stared at. She let her rage fly loose and stormed forward as Yang rushed through the door for her. The first clash of fiery fist against burning blade left the stone beneath them smoldering. Ignorant to the blistering heat around them, the two swung for one another again. Shockwaves of scorching wind and thunder followed every impact. Even at the peak of Yang's Semblance, Cinder could match her blow for blow.
But Ruby was not forgotten. The first time Crescent Rose rang out, Cinder whirled around her on a snake of flame that left the stone behind her cherry-red and swung out for Ruby. The only one who didn't thrive in the sweltering heat, Ruby was batted aside even through her guard. It left Cinder between the two sisters, but as long as she could see her prey, Cinder didn't care. She was beyond them, and Cinder wanted them to know it in their final thoughts. Her broadswords bounced between the two's strikes even as they took the advantage, their battle cries lost in the ever-growing chaos surrounding them. The air itself warped from the crippling heat. Ruby could barely breathe, and Cinder gladly took the advantage: she was quick enough to swipe and parry the stumbling girl's attacks, now.
Finally, the sisters saw an opportunity. Cinder kicked Ruby back and slammed her broadswords together to reshape them, and both sisters threw what they could into a last strike. Like the two girls were moving through molasses, Cinder easily slid back on another current of fire, then flew by with a wide swing of a molten scythe. A trail of blazing light followed, then all at once detonated and slammed Ruby and Yang into the now-smoking roof.
Ruby yelped in pain when her back hit the burning stone. She shot herself skyward and folded Crescent Rose to its rifle form. She was ready to shoot down any counterattack Cinder was planning to throw at Yang.
Cinder was watching Ruby, instead, pointing up at her with her bare arm. A glint of light sparked at her finger. Ruby took no chances. She forced herself to scatter into rose petals.
An immense boom reverberated through Ruby's core, and then she was spiraling down towards the ground. Her vision was dark and filled with spots. Her ears rang. Her chest felt like someone had pressed her against a stove. Though she couldn't move, she could at least feel her aura still surrounding her, half of it destroyed by a single... something. Cinder caught her eye. Golden sparks skittered across her arm.
Lightning? How?
Yang thankfully caught her before she hit the ground, keeping an eye on Cinder while Ruby got her feet back under her. She was regaining feeling in her body, but her muscles still tensed and twitched. Yang was stuck trying to defend her instead of using her Semblance on the offense. They were wide open. Yet Cinder only stood there, watching with her sly smile, but her eye ablaze. She chuckled to herself.
"What a perfect final memory of you nuisances." Cinder took a step back, and her aura came crashing down on the two in a field of strangling heat.
Then the smoke surrounding the library was blown aside by a Bullhead sweeping in between them. Cinder's smug attitude twisted into a bestial, livid sneer, and the heat slithered back from the sisters. She stomped her foot down but, remembering where she was, forced herself to swallow down her frustrations by the time the Bullhead swung around behind her. The door on its side opened, Emerald and Mercury waiting beyond it.
"All aboard!" Torchwick called from its speakers.
Cinder's composure proved ephemeral. "You'll have to wait!" she snapped over her shoulder, then turned her burning gaze back to the sisters. It was time she finished them off! Flames erupted around her, fueled by fury alone.
Yang swallowed down her fear: they stood a chance against Cinder together. But outnumbered? Her Semblance was fading. They had a little under half of their aura at most. Cinder could shoot lightning without Dust somehow. She glanced to Ruby, then to Cinder. Then, she made her choice. She stepped in front of her sister.
"Get to the others, alright?" Yang said.
With an explosion that demolished the ground behind her, Cinder launched herself for the two. Above, however, the choking smoke suddenly coiled in around a single point in the sky: Amity, hanging like a jewel in the chaotic night. The shadow of a black snowflake glyph pulsed behind the cinders. At its center, a red star.
In an instant, too fast for anyone but Ruby to see, the glimmer of red zipped past the Bullhead, past Cinder and straight through the library's roof. There was a flash of light the color of blood from below, then with a deafening crash greater than any thunder, a shockwave cleared the skies around them and tore the entire building asunder. Cinder was thrown back like dust in the wind to the crumbling edge of the roof. Wilting rose petals circled the library's remains in a storm as Cinder hissed out a curse and grabbed at her shoulder. Her amber aura flickered around a deep gash that had been torn across it.
Three black glyphs formed around her, and suddenly, she was outnumbered again: in a blur, Weiss, Adam and Blake landed on each, unharmed from their fall. With a flick of her rapier, Weiss formed a last dark glyph over Adam's hand and, guided with one of its own at its hilt, Wilt spiraled out of the annihilation it had left behind back into his clutch.
Grinning, the sisters leaped over the chasm left in Adam's wake to join their team. Cinder looked between the five readying their weapons. Her eyes widened a little upon seeing Blake. Her gaze grew wild, her nails unconsciously dug into her shoulder enough to draw more blood, and small jets of flame and smoke ignited each time she took a breath. As the Bullhead returned, and the combined Team RWAY and Blake raised their weapons, Cinder's rage boiled over. With an inhuman howl to the Grimm-infested night, she enveloped what remained of the library in a whirling conflagration. It reached up high enough to be seen across Beacon.
When the fires faded, Cinder was gone, and the Bullhead was already far into the distance.
Mrytenaster's Ice Dust was reduced to a trickle. Already turned translucent by the heat left behind, Weiss' defensive dome of ice splintered, then shattered into shards that were reduced to steam in seconds. She and Adam slowly rose to their feet on the scorched plaza grounds, blown away from the library. Or rather, what was left of it: only a blackened husk, a broken silhouette wrapped in flame, stood there now.
Weiss rushed for her Scroll the moment her senses returned to her, and sighed in relief when she saw the two sisters' aura safe and sound. Well, that might've been an exaggeration: they were still beat up, as were they all, but they must've escaped the blast. Weiss heard Adam sigh beside her, and looked over to see Blake jogging to the group, Ruby and Yang following behind.
"Well, that was a thing," Adam muttered under his breath. As the group gathered to make sure each was okay, however, his gaze settled on Blake. She barely said a word. Wrung her hands together. Ears twitched and laid flat enough to be obvious even through her bow. Eyes kept darting to Weiss in particular. They had no time to speak in the stadium itself, yet...
"Blake. What happened?"
The group turned to her. She looked away. But she didn't stay silent for much longer.
Despite the Bullhead's chassis still steaming from the intense heat, only a cold silence existed within. Her hair limp, eyes wide in frenzied anger and every step she took echoing like a gunshot, Cinder made her way past her companions. Made her way towards Penny. The wound to Cinder's shoulder hissed and smoked as her aura went to work repairing it. Emerald and Mercury had looked away, pretending to be disinterested. Even Torchwick was silent, his back to the two while he piloted the machine.
That urge had returned, whispering deep in Penny's core. Fighting was impossible, Penny knew. The only thought running through Penny's head as Cinder stalked closer was that she needed to escape, yet she stood her ground. Energy pulsed and thrummed in her chest, and while Cinder appraised her with eyes full of hatred, the fire burning in them felt familiar in a way Penny couldn't recognize.
Cinder stopped inches away. Penny struggled to match her gaze. Then, with a slow, creeping smile utterly detached from her glare, Cinder turned away.
"A consolation prize, at least," she said, and the stilted air finally cleared. "WMBB-01, password: ashes-to-ashes."
And Penny's fear vanished with it.
Beacon was at war. Even as deep in the campus as the former Beacon Library was, it had caught up: what were once shouts in the distance had become an ever-present scream of thousands trying to escape the grounds. The air was thick with countless, small Nevermores worming their way into buildings and battles alike. Rattle of gunfire and detonations of Dust rumbled through the air, the beat the cry of catastrophe was sung to. Down the streets of the burning plaza, civilians and what few students weren't on Amity fought for their lives. In every alley. In every building.
Yet with a swarm of Nevermores that had begun to circle the darkened stadium like a cloud of locusts, Amity too was not spared.
Blake stood without a word, unable to look at the rest of Team RWAY. But she couldn't hide from Ruby's sobs, or the constant scuffs of Adam's shoes as he paced back and forth. Or from the judgmental stares she felt boring into her from Yang and Weiss both. Explaining one's sins was meant to lift the guilt from your shoulders, Blake thought, yet right now she felt more crushed by it than she ever had before.
"Pyrrha was murdered just to get to a headmaster?" Yang repeated in shock.
"It's for these 'Maiden powers'," Blake murmured. "I... I don't have time to explain, and you probably wouldn't even believe me, but it's extremely important to Cinder. I don't know everything, I'm sorry: I don't even know why the White Fang isn't attacking Beacon like Cinder said they were."
Finally, Adam stopped. "The bomb," he said under his breath. "I'd found Mercury planting a bomb in Amity's core: if it's Dust-based, it could react with the crystal keeping it afloat!"
Blake's blood ran cold, and finally, she was forced to look up. All eyes were on her, now. "We need to get back there, then! That explains everything: the White Fang doesn't want Beacon. They want to destroy it!"
Adam flinched and glanced aside. "No. Not the White Fang. I..."
"What are those airships doing?" Yang suddenly asked. She pointed to the sky, and the others followed her gaze. Flashes of light ignited in the night sky as the dreadnoughts struck down not the Grimm, but their own fighters. Then, there was nothing. Only in its absence did the team—did all of Vale—realize how they'd already grown used to the scream and roar of the dreadnoughts' cannons. The airships all turned to face a single direction, Grimm swarming, yet never attacking.
Then the sky was ripped apart by a single volley of prismatic bolts from their main cannons. They sliced through the sky as one, lighting up Beacon until they disappeared behind the horizon. But they could still be felt: each bolt impacted like the hand of the gods themselves, shaking the team's very core even so far away from the epicenter. Explosions lit up the night like lightning in a storm. By the time the earthquake had ceased, the airships had changed in a different manner: the lead dreadnought, the largest thing in the skies other than Amity Coliseum itself, had two, massive banners hanging from its sides. White banners emblazoned with the crimson symbol of the White Fang.
Blake watched in a numb terror shared by all of Vale. Cinder said that Atlas would be handled, but this? If the White Fang had Atlas' dreadnoughts, they were unstoppable. No amount of Huntresses could take them on. Not while the Grimm could tear apart anyone flying there. Not while they could watch the sky. Not while the White Fang was keeping them busy in Vale itself. They could destroy Amity before reinforcements would arrive. Raze Beacon. Turn Vale to glass.
Yet no second volley came. No message, no demands, no assault. They only hovered in place, made by man, yet now for all intents and purposes the largest Grimm in Vale.
Finally, Yang spoke. "What the hell was that!"
"The docks are that way," Weiss answered. "They must've targeted the docks so that there's no way back up to Amity."
"Or to them," Adam added.
"Then we need a new plan," Yang punched her fist into her hand.
"Get Cinder," Ruby said with enough acid to draw the group's attention. Her grip on Crescent Rose was tight enough to tremble, and though her cheeks were still stained with tears, her eyes carried a fierce determination. "We take down Cinder before she gets to Ozpin, and we can at least stop whatever she's trying to do. Our plan hasn't changed: she's always been our top priority. All we need is a way to get to her."
"If we get a car, we won't need to burn all of our aura chasing the Bullhead down at top speed," Blake suggested.
"I can hot-wire one," Yang said.
"Then let's get moving," Ruby ordered.
As the group got ready to fight their way to a vehicle, Blake's attention was on Adam. He was trying to keep a straight face, but he was pale. He glanced back at every noise. He'd even started pacing again. Now was the time to be tense, but the rest of RWAY hadn't known Adam for as long as she did. He was never this nervous before a fight. Something was on his mind, but what?
Black tendrils of the Grimm's anathema rose across the roads as Adam paced past the monsters' corpses. Getting to a car was quick. Hot-wiring one took time. That was good. That was more time to think. Then again, it was more time to fear. More time to worry. The ringing of his Scroll trying to connect was the only noise he cared about right now, the only thing that could break through his thoughts.
Salem. Queen of Grimm. Ozpin's wars. It was easier to accept these claims from Raven when they weren't staring him in the face. But now? Not since he was a child first learning of the depths of the SDC's crimes had he ever felt so in over his head. All he had to stay afloat was one thing: he knew what they had to do to stop this. Kill Cinder. That was it. Right?
His Scroll went silent, and his thoughts dragged to a halt. The silence lingered for a moment longer.
"I've done what you requested," Almond's voice rang clear. "Speak."
"There's a bomb inside Amity Coliseum," Adam said without hesitation. "The coliseum is a bomb: it's made to react with the crystal inside."
A sharp inhale from the other side. But Almond's voice remained stoic. "Is that all?"
Adam looked over his shoulder at the rest of his team gathered around a car. No different than one easy to find in Vale or Beacon's own roads, but that was a good thing: they needed the average car's defense, however minor, against the Grimm. Though, in one slice, Ruby had sheared the top off of it altogether.
"We're going after Cinder." An unspoken offer of alliance. An opportunity to say where his loyalties lay.
After a pause, Almond responded: "Good luck." The line disconnected, leaving Adam with only his thoughts once more.
Behind him, Yang whistled. "Car's running, let's go!" she called.
Well. There was nothing to do now but hope that they could get rid of Cinder before she could use Amity herself. Whether that be as some grand assassination attempt or as a weapon of mass destruction. He took a last look at Amity Coliseum. Symbol of humanity finally coming together after the Great War. Symbol of a society that had rejected his kind for eons. There was a time where he wanted nothing more than to see it falling in flames. Right now, all he could see were the thousands trapped with a bomb beneath their feet.
"Do we still have eyes on them?" Adam asked as he jogged over to the driver's seat: his rifle wouldn't do much against a jet without his Semblance.
"Nope!" Ruby nodded to Weiss. "But we have something better!" The heiress flashed her Scroll and the map on it. A red dot pulsed, circling Beacon. The same tracking that'd found Penny in Mountain Glenn.
"How?" Adam asked. "Surely she didn't have her Scroll on her during the fight."
"It was worth a shot," Weiss said. "She must've added the Scroll's data to herself rather than carry a Scroll at all. It's as good a place to start as any." The marker abruptly changed direction, now moving straight for Beacon's center.
"No more time to talk," Yang said and hopped into the car. "She's probably headed for the headmaster now." The rest of the team followed suit. All but Blake, who looked back down the roads. Already, more Grimm had begun rampaging through the streets.
"I... I'm staying behind." Blake looked back to the four. "Stop Cinder: I'll help the citizens evacuate."
Weiss narrowed her eyes. "Now, hold on—"
"Go," Adam interrupted. "I trust you."
Blake herself looked like she wanted to protest that trust but, with a sharp nod, sprinted off and hopped her way up one of the buildings and out of sight.
Weiss and Adam shared a look, Weiss' complaint brimming in her eyes, and a simple reassurance in Adam's own. She huffed and shook her head. Satisfied, Adam hit the gas pedal and sent the car rushing down the street. Beside him, Ruby picked off any Grimm trying to get in their way, but they were far and few between. No, they were focused on the dorms and facilities they passed: a vast town of a campus turned into a battlefield. Stray bullets from the battles occasionally bounced off or even punched through the lightly armored vehicle.
"Not to be a downer," Yang called out as she punched a slug into a Beowolf leaping for an unaware student fending off an Ursa. "But they're moving a whole lot faster than us."
Ruby nodded back to Weiss, who hopped up to stand in the back seat. She twirled her rapier, and a path of shining glyphs spun into existence ahead. A last of gold formed beneath the car itself, and the whine of its engine grew ever louder. Weiss slid back into seat just in time for Adam to push the car to its limits, pressing the four back into their seats as the Grimm and buildings around them became little more than blurs.
Ahead, visible only by the flare of its thrusters, their target grew closer. Ruby took a deep breath and clutched Crescent Rose closer. "Alright, Team RWAY."
She aimed down her scope at the jet. "Let's save a kingdom."